Don't Tell
by everyothertuesday
Summary: London loves Sherlock Holmes and John Watson. But her boys have many secrets. London makes sure that they are kept. Post Reichenbach angst. Also, sentient London.


Everybody knows that Sherlock Holmes considers himself married to the work, his work, the criminal element. They forget fog, forget rooftops, they forget that sometimes, sometimes, when he is sleeping, Sherlock Holmes dreams of London, because she is his wife, and she is the work. They forget nightfall and knives and gunshots ricocheting off stone because once they were told all heroes have a foil, because they have forgotten that Sherlock is not a hero because don't make people into heroes, John, and I've disappointed you— no. You have disappointed London, your wife, don't tell John. Don't tell John. Don't tell John.

Don't tell John that Sherlock is leading him through the cracked streets of his mind palace, don't tell that Sherlock is secreting information between his DNA and within the folds of his jumper, don't tell about the emotion locked behind the doors of 221B. Don't tell John that Sherlock wears his coat as a wedding ring and John carries his own at the small of his back (Browning, bullets littered across her backbone, she doesn't mind).

Sometimes, sometimes, on muggy summer days when sugar sweet cloud banks smell of tea and ammonia Sherlock waits for the stars to creep out from behind the daylight because the stars are constant, the constant in his experiment, he's dabbling in the neuroscience of love, and sometimes he wonders if London is seeded with oxytocin like Baskerville was seeded with horrors, but London has horrors too and that is the work and she has the clues, the answer, his lovely wife. His lovely London. Because don't be stupid John, there's always an answer if you look hard enough, but sometimes looking hard enough is subjective, and sometimes hard enough burns out your humanity. I've been reliably informed I don't have one. You have a heart, Sherlock. John. Lovely, lovely John. Lovely London.

And then there is Moriarty and, at first, London thinks she could love another genius psychopath (highly functioning sociopath) no. Psychopath. Because Moriarty is not on the side of the angels, she learns this swiftly, and she cannot stop him. Don't tell Sherlock, don't tell John, but she can't stop him. She is London but he is the code that unlocks every door, the one written into one thousand government officials' heads. She hates him, because no-one touches her husband and no-one touches her John. John. Don't touch John, Sherlock's John, the mane with the cane? No. Not the invalid, not the small one, not the useless one, not Johnny Boy. John. The war veteran – doctor – blogger friend. John is so important, Sherlock says. London says.

And so Sherlock jumps from London's dirt-slicked rain-slicked blood-slicked rooftop and all he is thinking is JohnJohnJohnJohn but London is ruthless (is she? She is the work) and John forgets that, really, Sherlock would not loose like this. Phone-call, London remembers. She records it and hides it in her tiles and waits for her yard to find them (pleasepleaseplease take care of John London and Sherlock say but no-one hears. No-one listens). They are waiting for the fallout.

Don't tell John, London says. Don't tell John, don't tell John, you can't tell John.

Don't tell Sherlock, she whisper. Don't tell Sherlock but John is falling to pieces. Deduce them all, she says, and find them before they are lost. Bullets, she says. Find the bullets littered through her streets and you will find her John. But, she says, don't tell Sherlock when you find John looking for sand and heat and blood on gloves. Looking for Afghanistan in alleyways and street corners, telling stories in Dari or Pashto or Farsi. Don't tell Sherlock when you find a broken man. Don't tell Sherlock, don't tell John. London can keep secrets, she says. Can you?

No, no, you must, she says. London swathes herself in a black mourning cloak and it rains for days, for years. In summer she waits for tea and ammonia but it won't come, Sherlock won't come back, Jon won't come back to himself. Secrets, London says, are far too dangerous for you to understand. Don't tell Sherlock, don't tell John, you mustn't, she says. You mustn't. Keep them alive, she says. Keep the secret, she says. Keep running, she says.

She's waiting, she says, London says. She's waiting for time to slip from her spires and stop catching on the snags in her brickwork because, in time, her Sherlock and her John will come home. And on that day she will scream in one thousand different voices, in ravens' calls and car horns, she will laugh in great bubbling rivers of ale and once again her fog will carry the lingering aroma of too-sweet tea and ammonia. Because once again London will be whole, and she will swallow the florescent paint still clinging to her walls because belief won't be needed any more (you believed in Sherlock Holmes, no, you knew). Shhhh, don't tell John. He's waiting too.

London waits (John waits, shatters, did you find the bullets?) no. Captain John Watson is stalking the edges of her battlefield; you aren't haunted by the war, John. You aren't haunted by Sherlock, John. You miss it (him). John and London and Sherlock wait. Don't tell John. You promised. Don't tell Sherlock, London says.

They do not last a year. London is not surprised. Then again, neither is Sherlock.

Two-hundred and twenty-one bullets. 221B. Sherlock tells John a secret, tells London a secret. He says that these bullets caused two-hundred and twenty-one murders. And John laughs for the first time in months because Sherlock has collected them all and sometimes, sometimes, when London smells like tea and ammonia, Sherlock cries. John pretends not to notice, she pretends not to notice, you don't notice. Hush, settle down, London says. Leave my husband and his John be, she says. After all, you kept my secret.

Her secret is burning (her pool is burning) and all she can say is thank you for living/surviving/keeping the secret until it sunk your heart into the cradle of your pelvis. Thank you, she says, don't tell, thank you.

Tell Sherlock, she says. Tell John. Send sweet tea and ammonia into the breeze like a siren's call and sing the truth through my streets. Because London is whole again.


End file.
